Dreams of Happy
by Prascal
Summary: Naruto, Neji and Haku, together they became the Three Shadows, and their sacrifice were to be one of legends. Death/mourning/love/non-sexuall.


**Disclaimer:** I do not own Naruto...cry for me...

**This is a very old fanfiction of mine, Be aware, it is not my typical writing style.**

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**Dreams of happy:**

Kneeling on the ground, Panther could feel his body tremble from exhaustion, and yet the battle he was in was far from over. Somewhere in front of him he knew that his enemies was still hiding in the black cloud that was the result of a fire jutsu. A fire jutsu he knew had taken many of his ANBU comrades down, leaving himself and others more vulnerable and closer to defeat.

He lifted his gaze, and as the dark cloud was pulled aside, it revealed not the enemy, but three black shadows. Three shadows who's voices he could still hear, spoken words that still affected him. Before him stood three shadows, far to young to give up what they once had promised to give for the village. And through his white panther mask, the ANBU captain can see the black masks they promised not to give in to.

_"Hokage sama" One of the boys said. "We will not accept this offer, we are too young and we wish to grow at our own speed." He stood up and looked at them all, and they knew that he meant it._

_"We are to young to become your killers."_

Before him now, the enemy tried to break through the protecting chakra wall the shadows had created, but in vain. With one single hand gesture, the boys sent a wave of fire and death over their attackers, revenge hanging heavily in the air. Standing here at the wall of their village, they would lose the one thing they had left.

_"We will always obey you, and we will always fight for you, but this rank is not something that we have earned or deserved."_

Sitting on his knees, still lost in his memories of an night that could have been just yesterday, he saw the enemies be forced back, and out of their village. Without him even noticed, a few other ANBU had gathered around him.

"Captain?" The cat masked one, that he knew was Genma, asked worried that his leader might be hurt.

"I'm fine...it's just..." He made a hand gesture in the direction of the three young shadows. They where shielding of all attacks against them, and were doing a lot of damage on the enemy while slowly walking forward, pushing the enemy back.

The small group of ANBU watched in a few seconds of silence. They couldn't tare their gaze away from the scene: three black masked shinobi driving back a smaller army on their own.

"Who are they?" one of Panthers team-mates asked carefully, as if he was afraid of the answer that might come.

"They are our sacrefice." He told his men, not even bother to try and stand up. Thoughts where running through his head like winds in a storm.

_"One day, Hokage-sama, one day we will fight for you, we promise you that." Said the apparently youngest one._

Panther had never thought, Sandaime and Tsunade had never thought, and no one had ever hoped, that this day would come. The day when Orochimaru would attack once more. The day when war would be throwing itself at them. The day of the heroes to come, the time for a miracle he knew could come.

The time of death and bloodbath.

_"One day, we will be the strongest tools this village has ever possessed. We will give our all, this we promise you. We **will **be it's sacrifice."_

"Our sacrifice..?" One of his men asked. Even if he didn't understand it's meaning, the sound of those words scared him. It scared him a lot.

"Yes...our sacrifice. They where only children, one of them are Naruto Uzumaki, and just like him they are a few of this villages sacrifices...the only difference is that this was their own choice. They wanted it." Even if he could not see the faces of his men, he felt their confusion.

"A few years ago...they promised us that all they could give, that they **would** give their all to this village."

Kneeling before the Hokage, the ANBU captain and two Hunter nin Captains, three boys had spoken as one, on that day that felt just like yesterday.

"_We here by promise to give more then our life if we are called for. We promise each drop of our blood and every feeling in our heart to serve this village. We want to become it's sacrifice." And they were not joking._

"They made an owe that is deeper then the ones you and me took when we entered ANBU. They made an owe much more binding then the one used on hunter nins. Dear god...they..."

He could only shake his head in disbelief. The village had hated the other two as well, just like they had hated Naruto. The boys had been alone, living in a hell called life, and even so...they **wanted** to do this.

_No one had forced them to talk, no one had made them take this owe, but before them the three boys stood firm. Refusing to go back on their words._

"_Hokage-sama, you probably just think that we are talking nonsense, but please don't. We will keep this promise, and even if we have turned down your offer to be trained as Hunter nins, we will one day reach and go above that rank. Until then, this promise we give you by our free will is binding us to protect all weaker then us, you have our words on it."_

"I don't understand...who are they? Why would they do that?" One of the younger ANBU said, his eyes glued to the battle in front of him. And as he looked around, he saw that it was no wall, but a bubble. A bubble-chakra-shield big enough to cover entire Konoha.

"One of them the one in the middle...is Uzumaki Naruto, the Kyuubi container...and the other two are Haku of the mist, and Neji from the Hyuugia clan. They consider each other as sibblings."

"_Is this really what you want? Is this really what you should aim for? No love will be given to you for taking this burden." Panther said as he and the blond boy got a few minutes of privacy. The boy turned to face him._ _The black eyes of his mask meeting Panthers gaze._

"_I know that this village fears me ANBU-sama, but that is no reason for me not to defend and not to love them. Even if they will never love me, I will always be happy if I'm allowed to fight for them. My father taught me that much when he defended the village." _

_The boy looked straight into Panthers eyes_ _now, those white fox ears on his mask, with black and blood red tips looking like Panther's own._

"_I will not fear to be hated, Panther, nor will I hate those who fear me." And he walked away._

The boy hadn't even been old enough to become a genin by then, and Panther didn't take any of that talking seriously. But now, seeing as that boy, Naruto, and the two others where fighting...he knew he had been wrong.

There was a short moment of silence.

"Oh.." Where the only response from the four ANBU standing beside Panther. There were no words to say, and they simply watched as the last remaining men of Orochimaru where killed by the three. Naruto, Neji and Haku, the ones that had been born only to be feared by those they were fighting for. It was the ultimate twist of fate.

"_My past, the hate from my clan...it doesn't bother me anymore. I feel no need to revenge, I only feel the need to defend the two things I have now." Neji said calmly._

"_And what would that be?" Asked Tsunade just as calm._

_The boy looked up from his position beside his 'brothers' on the floor._

"_The love to this village and the love to my brothers."_

Both Tsunade and Panter had noticed that the boys chakra had melted together, that they now where sharing the three different blood line limits thanks to this. It wasn't bad though, it just made the boys the more perfect tools. It made them even more deadly.

"Captain-sama..."

"Yes, Genma?" Panther answered, voice emotionless.

"Will they...die? Is this a suicide jutsu they are using?" Genma asked carefully, hoping for the answer to be a clear 'no'. He actually liked that Naruto kid, he wasn't as bad as people said he was.

"Yes...I think it is. Even if they didn't plan it to be, they are releasing enough chakra to tare them apart the very same second they try to cancel it...so as soon as they are done here...they will most likely die." Panther slowly stood up now, watching as the boys eliminated the last few gigantic snakes sent by Orochimaru.

The five ANBU could only watch as Neji started to stumble and bleed. They could only watch as the boys fell one after the other. Their big chakra bubble being canceled and their chakra slowly starting to die out, fading away from the ANBU nins minds.

"_Hokage-sama...please let us live like everyone else in our age. We want to graduate like the others, and we want to take the chuunin exams with others in our age...we want to keep this last piece of a normal life, and the last piece of our childhood."_

_They all loked up at the adults with that last word showing in their eyes._

"_It looks like if you three have lost most of it already. How are you going to keep this big promise of yours if you want a normal life?"_

"_Even dogs on a leash can choose where to go with it, Hokage-sama."_

The boys had said nothing more, and they had taken their exams to be genins with others in their age, a part of their innocent dream coming true.

With his four ANBU nins, Panther slowly walked over to the place where the bodies of three young boys laid curled together. Blood was all over the ground, coming from wounds they never had time to feel. They laid curled together, like if they where deep asleep, but Panther knew better. Everything was going in slow motion as one of his men reached down to look for a pulse they all knew he wouldn't find.

_"We are to young to become your killers..."_

"_We here by promise to give more then our life if we are called for. We promise each drop of our blood and every feeling in our heart to serve this village. We will to become it's sacrifice."_

"_I will not fear to be hated, Panther, nor will I hate those who fear me."_ Naruto... almost 14 years old.

"_My past, the hate from my clan...it doesn't bother me anymore. I feel no need to revenge."_ Neji... 15 years old.

_"One day we will fight for you, we promise you that."_ Haku... not older then 15 years old.

'They were only kids...'Panther thought.

"Captain! I have a pulse on this one!" Genma yelled.

As the eye cracked open, they could all hear his weak voice in their head, calling out for someone else then them.

_"don't leave...me, I want to...be with...you..."_

And then his eyelid closed itself as darkness took over his mind.

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**This is an old fanfic of mine, that I have rewritten....I don't know though...it is an old fanfic, and I don't even see my own writing stle in it – it is THAT old. Maybe TBC, maybe not.**


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